Re: [docbook-apps] Re: including non-xml

[maxwell <maxwell@umiacs.umd.edu>]

On Thu, 29 Apr 2010 16:32:13 +0100, Ivan Ristic <ivan.ristic@gmail.com>
wrote:
> On Mon, Apr 26, 2010 at 11:26 PM, maxwell <maxwell@umiacs.umd.edu>
wrote:
>> Sounds like a job for Literate Programming.  Instead of keeping your
>> source code and examples in external file(s), keep them in your DocBook
>> document, and extract them automagically to produce the source code in
>> the programming language.
> 
> I can see how that could work in some simple cases. For anything other
> than trivial programs, the edit-compile-run cycle would be very small
> because of the inability to use an IDE or edit the source code
> directly.

We do edit the program fragments directly, in a programmer's editor.  They
are contained in separate files, and x-included into the DocBook document. 
The point of the literate programming approach is not to make you edit
everything in one application, but to document the result in an enduring
way, including bringing all the test cases and program code together in one
place in a coherent way (as opposed to a bunch of files with maybe a
readme)--and maybe most importantly, to document all this in a way that
will allow people in the future to understand what you have done.

I haven't thought through the IDE issue, because I dislike IDEs.  Your
mileage may vary...

   Mike Maxwell